Left 4 Dead 2 : Southern Comfort
by PainesZankioII
Summary: Follow the immune Ellis, Rochelle, Nick and Coach as they battle the infection and deal with the new "changing" infected that make their survival, that much more difficult.
1. Hit The Road

**Hi, just wanted to throw this out there. This is my first Fic, and I am looking to improve my writing, seeing as it's reallllly not that good, so I figured it'd be a good idea to toss something on here, and let y'all tear it to shreds. Be as brutal as you want, it'll only help me. Thank you. :)**

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"One time, Keith almost drowned in the tunnel of love," Ellis stated proudly. "Then we got ice cream."

His thick southern accent and oblivious demeanor were easily distinguishable amongst the bantering of the group and the rapid slams against the solid oak door in front of them.

"Really? Right now Ellis?" Coach sighed, gripping his axe and hesitantly moving towards the front door of the house they'd been holed up in for some time now. The violent banging on the front door still did not stop.

"As long as you don't invite him in," Ellis' voice shot over from the smoky corner where Nick was sitting. "Then they ain't gonna be gettin' in."

Nick smirked, and after picking up his revolver and ducking out his cigar, he walked towards Coach, who was dripping with beads of sweat.

"Easy boss, don't wanna burn too many calories," Nick said, and pressed against the wall near the front door. Rochelle stood by with one hand on her hip and the other one holding her temples.

"Right, because they're vampires now I forgot. How the hell did I ever get stuck with y'all..." she just shook her head.

"You love me, you know it," Ellis smiled bashfully shooting his fingers at her like a fake gun.

She laughed and tugged on her handgun which was tucked away snug in her belt.

"I got a real gun mother fu-" she stopped, giggling almost childishly. The first time she smiled in hours.

"Now!" Nick yelled as he whipped open the door violently and the lone infected stumbled into the room. Coach charged the infected readying his axe and swinging down connecting perfectly with it's neck.

"Ugh, oh my God..." Rochelle groaned watching the infected corpse fall and writhe on the floor with his neck split open, extensively gushing blood.

"That never gets old," Ellis laughed. "That reminds me of this one time Ke-"

"Ellis, shut up," Coach said, wiping the blood off his axe onto the corpse's shirt and walking into the next room. Nick lit up his cigar again and plopped onto the couch, lifting a picture frame off the nightstand.

"I bet you 50 rounds that she's dead right now," he smirked glancing at Ellis, tapping the woman in the picture.

"You think I'm stupid or something?" Ellis' slow southern drawl made it hard for Rochelle to keep from laughing. Nick chuckled and Rochelle turned around to keep from showing her face.

"Oh now you're all smiles, I gotcha, don't you worry," Ellis sighed and sat next down next to Nick.

"So let's talk about this," Rochelle started inquisitively. "How'd y'all figure out that you was immune?"

"The prick bastard scratched me, and ripped my brand new suit. That's how," Nick said turning his back and sliding down his suit jacket so they can see the gash above his shoulder.

"Ouch." Rochelle turned around lifting up her shirt exposing the scratch on her back which didn't look too bad.

"Y'all wanna see mine?" Ellis asked almost happily.

"Easy buddy," Nick started, shooting a glance at him.

Ellis removed the strap holding his shotgun in place firmly on his back and set it down as he lifted up his shirt. His ripped chest and abs might have made Rochelle bite her lip as she stared in awe, if it weren't for the bite mark on his side.

"Oh shit, you can see the teeth marks," Nick gasped.

"That's disgusting... what did it feel like?" Rochelle inquired.

"Felt like I got bit," Ellis answered, unaware of his ridiculously uninformative answer.

"Have you even tried to treat that?" Rochelle stood up and walked over to lift his shirt higher.

"You know that can get infected; we should do somethin' about that," she said, taking the med pack off of her belt and setting it down on the counter.

"At least I ain't gon' turn into a zombie," Ellis smiled winking at Rochelle.

"Ain't that an icebreaker right there?" Nick butted in. "Zombie eh? I was waitin' for someone to say the magic Z word."

He stood up brushing off his suit.

"Which one of y'all dumb shits left the damn door open in the back?" Coach's voice entered the room along with his big self. "I swear to God. If I get bit, scratched, touched, puked on, spit on, anything… so help me God."

"Easy fella, gotta watch your blood pressure," Nick said walking towards the room Coach was just in. "Besides, none of us has even been in the back."

Rochelle took out her handgun and patted Nick on the chest.

"I got this one don't worry," she smiled and walked out of the room.

"Did you get bit?" Coach asked, looking at the blood stain on Ellis' shirt.

"Yep," he laughed. "Wanna see?"

Rochelle moved through the tight corridors of the old farm house and walked into the kitchen. There was a slight bang from the next room, making her jump. She lifted her gun and aimed it quickly around the corner into the small room where wind repeatedly pushed the door decorated in white drapes into the wall.

"Coach! You didn't think to shut the door?" she yelled.

"I did shut the damn door," his deep voice carried through the rooms.

"Shut the door my ass…" she sighed, closing the door.

Walking back through the kitchen she stopped at the sight of a box of Fruit Loops sitting on the counter.

"Sweet," she said. "I'm starving."

She continued, now checking the cabinets for which one had a bowl in it. A low gurgling growl stopped her in place.

"The hell..?" she whispered to herself.

Lifting her gun once again, she slowly guided herself around the island counter top in the center of the room. The noise was most certainly coming from the next room.

She made her way slowly, watching each step. The door was partially open, so she moved closer trying to see through the crack. Something darted by quickly, releasing a strange cry unlike the infected she had grown slightly accustomed to.

"Oh screw this!"

She grabbed the doorknob and pulled the door closed and backed up against the wall trapping it inside. Suddenly the door started jerking violently as whatever was on the other side screamed inhumanely and banged on the door.

"What the fuck...?"

She began to panic.

"Ellis! Coach!" she yelled as the flimsy door cracked down the middle. The gargling screams shook her more than anything she had experienced the last few days. As if whatever it was had charged the door from afar the door split further and a large chunk of the center had busted open. Rochelle aimed her gun shakily. It lifted its head and looked through the hole at her. Its mouth salivated and its eyes were completely white. The hooded man dove backwards just as she squeezed off a shot. It moved faster than any of the infected they'd previously encountered. Rochelle ran away from the doorway as the zombie busted through with a rabid leap. The hooded creature stood up extending its fingers. It swiped its claws at her, scratching the wall. Rochelle fired a few more rounds and hit it in the chest twice, but it dropped down to the floor in a crouching position unphased.

"Rochelle! Where are you girl?!" Coach yelled.

"I'm ova here!" she yelled, running backwards and firing off two more shots, missing both.

The creature jumped and tackled her to the floor.

"Get this thing off me!" she screamed, struggling as it tried to dig its claws into her, ripping her shirt.

After slamming her head into the creature's, it seemed disoriented for a second while on top of her. Rochelle fired off three shots almost directly in its forehead. The hooded creature slumped over on her. Panicking and still screaming, she shoved him aside and stood up covered in blood, breathing heavily. Coach ran up to her and held her as she tried to avoid crying.

"Is that your blood?!" Ellis stared in shock.

"What the fuck is that?" Nick walked over to the body, picking up its arm. "These nails...er claws?"

"We can't stay here anymore," Rochelle choked out. "We gotta get the hell outta town."

She cringed, looking down at the blood covering her.

"You okay?" Ellis asked as Rochelle walked by still shaking. "From now on we don't leave each others' sides, ya hear?"

He consoled her as she looked up at him and smiled slightly.

"It reminds me, there was this one time where me and Kieth-" Ellis continued.

Coach interrupted him as he walked by, shaking his head angrily. Ellis understood instantly to quit talking.

Nick put his arm on Rochelle. "Sweetheart, you're gonna have to tell us what happened."

"I already told you, that thing busted through the God damn door. Jumped across the damn hallway and onto me," she started. "Where I shot it in the damn face three fuckin' times."

When she finished, she was breathing heavily again.

"So that's it then, they're changing?" Nick asked rhetorically.

"Well then we just gonna have to kill 'em all then," Ellis said, tucking his handgun in his jeans and grabbing the shotgun from his back.

Coach walked over from the other room with a pink shirt and a towel in his hands.

"Here Ro," he smiled, handing the two things to her. "Get ya self cleaned up and we'll move out."

"Where we goin?" she asked.

"The docks seem like best bet," Nick said calmly. "There's this boat. I can get us on it if it's still there."

Rochelle turned around changing shirts.

"You got a boat?" she asked.

"Don't worry about what I got," Nick snarled. "But no, I don't."

"Then why we goin' to the docks?" she asked sarcastically.

"I said I could get us on a damn boat," he answered.

Ellis scratched his chin.

"Why didn't you say so before?" he asked.

"I didn't think about it," Nick groaned.

"Alright everyone just stop it and let's get our act together. The docks it is. It's worth a shot," Coach spoke loudly, taking control of the conversation. "Nick says he may have a boat we can get on. Best case scenario, we get on it."

"What's the worst case scenario?" Ellis questioned.

"I'm pretty sure you can figure that one out on your own," Coach said picking up his axe, and putting away his handgun.

"Oh... okay..." Ellis smiled awkwardly. "Just wish Nick woulda told us he had a boat sooner."

"I don't have a God damn boat!" Nick yelled.

The four walked outside the house through the field which was muddy from the rainstorm from the night before.

"We should stop by town yeah?" Ellis questioned, stepping over a half-submerged corpse that they probably had shot the previous night. Coach nodded and they continued walking.

The screeching voice of an infected startled them as it made its way through the field towards them.

_Bam!_

Nick fired a round, hitting it in the head. It fell to the floor.

"Let's hustle," he said putting another bullet in the chamber of his revolver.

The survivors instinctively started to jog, and when they reached the pavement of a street, they turned to follow it.

Two more infected lay crouched over a body ahead of them. Both looked up and stumbled as they stood up and charged at the group. Another from the left came running.

Several shots later, the infected were put down and they continued forward.

"You guys shoulda seen the way the thing moved..." Rochelle started. "I mean, it was so fast, and then the way it eyed me as it crawled towards me before it jumped... it was crazy."

Chills rushed through her body.

"Hey, don't think," Ellis pat his hand on Rochelle's shoulder. "Just shoot-"

Ellis was interrupted by the sound of a loud horn blaring through the night.

"Well I'll be damned," he smirked.

"There's others!" Coach yelled and began to hustle down the road.

"Ah hell, with all that noise they're good as dead," Nick stated carelessly.

The road was slightly foggy and surrounded by fields on both sides and the infected wandered aimlessly through them.

"I ain't 'bout to sit here," Ellis cut in, chasing after Coach, who really hasn't gotten that far.

"Hey!" Rochelle shouted, but low enough to not draw the attention of the infected nearby. "You think that's drivable?"

She nodded towards a rusted blue pickup truck half off the road, not too far behind them.

The four quickly scurried to the pickup, pumping lead into two more infected along the way.

"Pop the hood," Ellis seemed delighted to say.

Rochelle hopped into the driver seat and pressed the button to open the hood of the car.

"I'll drive," Rochelle said as Coach hopped up onto the truck bed.

"Like hell," Ellis argued. "I work on cars six days a week."

"That don't mean you can drive," she snapped.

"Aw hell..." he sighed.

"Shotgun!" Nick said, almost laughing as he ran around the other side.

"Y'all are some bitches," Ellis sighed closing the hood. "I hope the keys aren't even-" he stopped himself as Rochelle dangled the trucks keys out the window.

Starting the car, she began to drive forward.

"Aw, come on!" Ellis yelled running towards to the back. Coach reached his hand out.

"Looks like you're ridin' wit me boy," he said, lifting Ellis up as he jumped over the side into the back.

Ellis cocked his shotgun and took a knee.

"Ya know, one time, Kieth drove his car off a cliff and broke both legs," he started, "it wasn't a funny ha ha story though."

Coach just put his hand over his face and shook his head.

"Shh...Let's just enjoy the ride Ellis," he said in a low tone, although his deep voice was loud enough to hear over the engine. "This might be the last time we get a chance to relax."

"I'm starvin'," Ellis mumbled, as he turned his head to watch the infected run from out of the fields to chase the pickup.

**---**

**Lemme know what you think, continue, scrap, jump off a bridge? I just want to get better. :)**


	2. Enter Ellis

**Enter Ellis**

The door to the garage, cracked just a bit, let in an unusual amount of sunlight. It was a hot day and the sun was shining brightly, but Ellis was oblivious to it.

"Oh Ma, it ain't nothin to be worried about," Ellis sighed. "Just some more over-hyped democratic B.S." He pumped the jack which lifted rear of the rusted tan station wagon up just barely off the ground. His little shop was filled with an array of tools on the walls, all weathered from previous use. A tall elderly woman sporting a light blue blouse with some sort of dragonfly as a design hovered over him as he looked around for his cross wrench.

"Probably some new variation or whatever of Mad Chicken disease." he stated bluntly.

"Mad Cow? I'm just sayin' that maybe we should go visit your brother in Texas," his mom choked out. "It's all in the timing. A visit is long due, at least until this sickness is under control."

"What in the hell makes you think I wanna even see him, really now?" Ellis said, slightly elevating his voice as he loosened the nuts on the tire. He sighed and took a breath and pumped the jack raising the car in the air this time and loosening the nuts.

"If this is about those damn sick people in Atlanta, it's just the same old shit," he sighed.

"Watch your tongue boy," she reprimanded him. "They quaran... tized."

"Quarantined," Ellis corrected her. "They quarantined the city, yeah I know this."

He shook his head as he removed the nuts from the tire completely.

"They quarantined the entire city- that doesn't scare you?" she inquired. "Not just one bit?"

"Nothin' scares me Ma," he stated boldly. "Ain't nothin' to be a'scared of."

he smirked while flexing his arms.

"I ain't gonna let you go crazy over some stupid illness miles away. Ain't nobody even gonna be around here to even get ya sick."

"Ding dong," a male voice shot from the doorway to his garage. "Hiya Missus Barton! What are you doin in this greasy ol' garage? You're too pretty for that."

It was Keith, and he looked as if he had been wading through mud. The dried mud on his hands and arms signified he had fallen into something.

"Oh, you always know how to make an old lady smile," Ellis' mom blushed as she hurried over to Keith, who glanced around the room.

"Old?" he said acting surprised. "I don't see no old ladies."

"It should not be takin' me this long to change a tire." Ellis sighed.

"Hey buddy," Keith said with a smile. "How's it hangin?"

Ellis' mom stood staring him up and down.

"You been crawlin' around in dirt?" she questioned.

"Ah, somethin' spooked Benji this mornin' he ran off through the neighbors field chasin' it," he answered.

Ellis lifted the tire off and put it next to him on its side.

"Benji don't get scared," Ellis laughed. "He's like me, he was prolly just pissed off at something."

"I know- it was bad. I chased him as far as I could. It was crazy. I chased him all the way to the neighbor's garage," he sighed. "Ya know Mr. Partison's garage-house thing, with all the trees around it? I'm sittin' here looking around, hopin' not to get shot and I hear a damn dog barking way behind me."

"I'm going to get you some of Ellis' clothes and a wash cloth," Mrs. Barton interrupted. "I won't have you lookin' like this, you must feel horrible."

"I'd appreciate that very much so," Keith nodded as she hurried slowly out the garage. "But no, turns out I wasn't chasin' Benji… must've got confused...or somethin'."

"Haha," Ellis laughed, resting himself on the tire near him. "What, you chased another dog?"

"No, but listen," Keith said, the tone in his voice changing drastically. "I saw someone in the woods. He was far away- I couldn't get a good look- but he looked frantic."

"Whatcha mean?" Ellis asked tilting his head. "Was it Mr. Partison? He's a crazy fuck ya know."

"I don't even know man, I don't know why I even brought it up, I'm sure Benji will come around," Keith replied.

"He always does," Ellis smiled, lifting the new tire onto the car.

"So let's talk shop buddy," Keith grinned, resting on the bench near him.

"You aint knowin' shit about cars," Ellis laughed, tightening the nuts on the vehicle by hand. "Knowin' Ma, she's probably fixin' some supper for us, now that you're here."

"I'm fuckin' starving; that sounds wonderful right about now."

"Hey, Ellis," Nick said in his most mock-southern accent, snapping Ellis back from his dreamlike state. Nick was hanging through the small window in the back of the pickup. "Whatcha thinkin' about buddy?"

"Nah, nothin', just thinkin' bout stuff," Ellis responded in a soft manner.

"Good, because you guys gotta keep watch," Nick answered as the pickup pulled over to the side of the road. "Cuz Rochelle has got to do some lady stuff."

Nick laughed as Rochelle groaned and mentioned something about 'just having to take a piss.'

The road on both sides was surrounded by woods and it was completely dark out now; a light haze obscured their view even more. Coach had been resting his eyes with his arms crossed against the truck beds walls.

"Wake up Coach, it's time to keep lookout," Ellis said tapping Coach's shoulder as he woke up in a panic.

Ellis looked over the side of the pickup at Rochelle who was moving into the woods.

"I can always go with ya!" he said laughing.

"I swear," Coach stated angrily. "I think you guys forget that everyone around us is dead."

"Huh?" Ellis looked at Coach with the most confused face.

"How are you so damn happy all the time?" Coach asked sternly.

"Well, we're alive ain't we?" Ellis answered with a grin satisfied by his own response. "More than enough of a reason to be happy."

"Shit!" Rochelle screamed from the woods, followed by three or four shots echoing in the night.

"Damn!" Ellis barked, hopping over the side of the truck and darting into the brush.

Nick and Coach followed behind, left in the dust as Ellis was much faster.  
Ellis approached Rochelle who aimed her flashlight and gun at him.

"Don't shoot!" he said as he ran over to her looking around for the body of whatever she had just shot, but could not find anything.  
"False alarm..." she sighed. "I thought I saw something."

Coach arrived with Nick who seemed confused to find no attacker.

"Aw, it was nothin'. Rochelle just shot a tree," Ellis answered the unasked question.

Coach chuckled as he turned around to head back to the pickup.

"You like Depeche Mode?" Ellis inquired, noting Rochelle's pink shirt.

Just then a dark figure slammed into Ellis, knocking him to the floor.  
Screams of a few more infected grew louder as the footsteps grew closer, attracted by the sound of Rochelle's gun.

Nick ran up to the infected, which was snapping his mouth at Ellis, who struggled not to get bit. He pulled it backwards and threw it on the ground. Coach fired off a few shots into the dark woods in the direction of the groans unclear if he had even hit any of them.

"Bitch!" Ellis yelled standing up, kicking the infected in its face as it fought to get up.

Nick slammed his heel into the infected's face.

"Move your asses already!" Coach yelled firing off another two shots. "What the fuck they all doin' in the middle of the woods?!" he yelled.

An infected moved closer and let out a raspy yell, coughing as if it were choking.

"Nothing like a good ol' curb stompin' eh?" Nick laughed while Ellis stood there with a blank face firing a round into the bloody infected's head. Rochelle turned around amidst the confusion.

"You did not just..." she said, stabbing Nick with her eyes, shaking her head.

The four ran towards the truck, with a few infected chasing behind them. Nick spun around firing, hitting the closest one and knocking it backwards. Rochelle ran around the side and got in the driver seat. Nick jumped in the passenger seat. Coach struggled a bit but lifted himself over the side onto the back of the pickup.

The choking sound grew louder now and closer by, mixed in with the groans and screams of the infected. Ellis hopped up on the side but before he could get over, he was constricted by a slimy wet substance wrapping his entire body.

"Oh shit!" he yelled as the slimy rope pulled him down to the ground, he let out a scream as it began dragging him back into the woods towards the infected who changed course for him.

"No no no no!" Rochelle yelled and Coach grabbed his axe and jumped over the side back onto the street and took off running into the woods with his weapon raised. Rochelle gasped as an infected ran out from the woods on the driver side.  
Nick ran out after them firing at the attackers as the seemingly empty woods poured infected onto them. Coach slammed his axe into two infected, pulling it out and running after Ellis' screams as the infected dragged him further. One of the infected ran up behind Coach and swiped at him as Nick shot it in its nape.

"Fuck!" Rochelle yelled, shooting at the closest infected charging the car. She reached over and shut the passenger door and rolled up the windows as a few more ran up to the car slamming on the sides leaving bloody streaks where they hit.

Ellis gasped for air as the tight wet rope pulled him towards the sounds of wheezing and coughing. Nick charged at Ellis and tackled him pinning him to the floor.

"The fuck!" Coach lifted his axe, slamming down onto whatever was constricting Ellis.

Blood shot out of it and Nick helped Ellis up, as Coach took out his handgun and ran towards the figure. Ellis freed himself of the disgusting slimy rope and coughed for a bit then took out his gun as more infected drew closer.  
Coach shined his flashlight on the creature that had pulled Ellis more than 90 yards through the woods.

The slimy wet rope, was coming out of the creature's mouth; it was its tongue. It had a grotesque face which was bubbling with boils and releasing what appeared to be a green tinted smoke. It coughed as it started moving backwards. Coach fired off several round into it and it hit the ground hard, the sacks on his face exploding into a cloud of the same green smoke. Coach covered his mouth and began to run back towards the vehicle. Ellis choked on the smoke as it filled the air. Nick pulled on his arm as they ran towards back, where Rochelle and her muffled screams which could be heard just barely amongst the infected's yells.

Rochelle slid open the small window which Nick had been leaning out of earlier, and climbed out onto the back, picking up her gun. She reached back through the window and grabbed a clip, swapping it with the empty one. The infected reached over the sides of the truck to grab at her as she fired into the crowd of about six. Nick ran up behind one of them and threw it backwards against a tree, then fired a well-placed shot in between the eyes. The bodies of the infected surrounded the truck and Ellis jumped up top with Rochelle, who was holding her head.

"You okay?" Ellis asked, giving her a gentle hug.

"The fuck, I'm fine," she said, staring confused at him. "What the hell even happened to you? Are _you_ okay?"

"Yeah I'm good," he replied. "I don't know what happened, but I'm good."

"Start this bitch up!" Nick yelled closing the passenger door.

Rochelle ran around the the side and got in, starting the truck. Coach hopped in the back, and pounded twice on the side to signal the 'ok' to drive.

"We got a whole lot more problems than we thought we had boy," Coach shouted, clearly out of breath.

Ellis ran his hands through the saliva dripping down his yellow shirt with the words "Bull Shifters" printed on it.

"It was a tongue, wasn't it?" he said making a disgusted face. "Man, I really dig this shirt too."

"Well, look at the bright side," Coach comforted him. "We're alive right?"

Ellis let out a small laugh then smiled. "This shit won't cut it. Next store we pass, I'm grabbin' me a new shirt, an expensive one. Maybe a new hat, I love hats."

"Still gotta look good, I hear ya," Coach chuckled.

"Zombie apocalypse or not," Ellis responded. "Gotta dress to impress."

Rochelle hit a bump which made him lose balance, and he stumbled around for a second.

"Very impressive," Coach said, laughing. "You're a good kid Ellis."

"You guys gonna kiss now or what?" Nick stated with a grin, poking his head through the small window again.

Coach glared at Nick angrily for a second as Ellis puckered up and blew a kiss jokingly at Nick.

"Watch yourself boy," Nick laughed.

"The hell? With the 'boy' and the 'kid'," Ellis said, offended. "I'm twenty-one years old and y'all just keep houndin' on me."

"Awww, twenty-one," Nick laughed.

Coach nodded in agreement with a smile. "You's a baby."

"Quit it," Ellis sighed, looking over the side at the passing trees as Rochelle turned the vehicle onto the dirt road to the right. A few scattered infected ran out onto the road. Ellis lifted his handgun aiming shooting once at the one nearest the truck, despite it not being able to catch up.

"Hey, take out your teen angst some other way," Nick scolded. "I don't see an ammo dispenser here, do you?"

"Teen," Ellis started. "I'm twenty-one!"

"Black Jack," Nick said, smiling. "I'd kill to play some cards right now and that is by no means an understatement."

"Well, I'll be sure to pick us up a deck on our next store run," Ellis replied.

"Kid, you don't wanna play me in cards," Nick replied cockily. "You're still wet behind the ears."

Ellis huffed and shook his head.

"Okay now, you get back in your lil' window now, thanks," he sighed, motioning for Nick to 'shoo'.

Coach just sat there laughing silently.

"I liked ya better when you were quiet," Ellis added as Nick shut his little window.

"So we got the predator huntin' down Rochelle," Ellis thought out loud. "The, umm... 90-year-old smoking person...?"

"Don't forget the tongue- that shit was the size of the bus!" Coach added.

"So we got Hunter," Ellis stated, giving them names. "And, what do you think about Tongue-Man?"

"Smoker, sounds a bit easier on the tongue," Coach answered. "No pun intended."

Ellis tapped the window and Nick slid it open.

"Hey Ayliss," Nick said smiling, his voice a blatant mock yet again.

"What y'all think about this, what sounds better… Tongue-man or Smoker?" Ellis asked.

Rochelle looked in the rear view at him. Nick sighed and ignored the question.

"I dunno what the hell that means, but Tongue-Man sounds absolutely fuckin' stupid," she replied, laughing heavily.

"Smoker it is," Ellis sighed, pulling his head out the little window. "Hunter, Smoker, Zombie."

"According to the news, they ain't dead, they're sick," Coach stated in a matter-of-fact way. "Infected."

"Zombie?" Ellis said lifting his brow.

"Infected," Coach responded sternly.

"Zom...bie?"

"Infected, Ellis," Coach sounded aggravated.

"Brains? Zombie," Ellis answered teasingly and nodding his head, confirming this opinion with himself.

"Yes, zombie," Coach gave in. "They're zombie enough."

Rochelle cursed from inside the cab and pressed the brakes. Ellis and Coach stood up to look over the truck and ahead of them. A camouflage Hummer sat half off the dirt road ahead of them next to a barricade blocking the road.  
Ellis hopped over the side, joining Nick who was walking over to the Hummer already.

"Oh man, did this just get interesting or what?" Nick said pulling open the door to the military vehicle and hopping in the driver seat. Rochelle exited the vehicle moving towards the roadblock.  
"Good ol' CEDA," she said to herself walking over to a sign on the makeshift barricade.

_You are about to enter a quarantine zone.  
In accordance with CEDA emergency management policies:  
firearms are not permitted.__  
_  
"Oh shit y'all drop ya guns," Rochelle said loudly. "We gon' get arrested."

"Now what kinda hypocritical bullshit is this?" Coach sighed walking over to her. The DANGER sign above her read Civil Emergency and Defense Agency.

"Highly contagious area. Arm yourselves. Barricade your homes," Coach read the sign out loud as Ellis walked over. "Wait for official instructions."

"Wait my ass," he laughed and pulled down the sign crinkling it up.

"Kill all sons of bitches," Ellis stated, cocking his shotgun. "That's my 'fficial instructions."

He finished off with a grin and a head nod towards the group. Rochelle shot a smile over at him which made him almost blush.

Down the dirt road a few scattered buildings could be seen, as well as a CEDA van, and to the left stood one of the tents they had set up during emergencies.

"We got some bad ass weapons over here!" Nick yelled from the Hummer.

"Y'all ready for some fun?" Ellis asked, still not wiping the grin off his face.

"I'll be damned!" Coach yelled, staring at the white tent in the distance.

A person in a biohazard suit walked out of the tent for a moment, then proceeded to go back inside.

"Come on grab your shit let's go!" Ellis shouted. "I hope they don't shoot us."

**-----------**

**Thanks for the reviews,  
So I'm almost positive I mutilated and gutted some of the characters personalities. I have no clue how they're supposed to be, so I just went along with it. Had the game been out I'd look into them more. and yeah, Obviously I do not own any of these characters or anything. lol  
**

**Please R/R. I appreciate honesty. :]**


	3. Miracle Rooms

Ellis crouched over the corpse of the CEDA member. Its hazmat suit face mask was shattered and splashed with trickles of blood from the smoking bullet wound between its eyes.

"You got what you wanted," Nick sighed. "Ya happy now?"

Ellis tucked his gun back in the lining of his pants and stood up looking at him confused.

"What?"

"They didn't shoot at us," Nick replied while looking through some of the papers on the desk near him.

The wind sounded much louder from inside the white tent, which was practically empty aside from a few scattered papers, some pens, markers, a laptop which wouldn't turn on, and some deceased men in gear that was supposed to prevent them from harm in case of a chemical leak.

"Funny," Ellis stated flatly. "You should do stand-up. I once knew a stand-up comedian— his name was Ralph— and boy was he funny. Except not funny in the way you'd want someone ta be funny, ya know? He always used to say the most inappropriate things at the worst times. He was _genius_."

Rochelle snorted in laughter at the irony of his statement. Nick ignored the comment and picked up a black marker moving over to the nearest wall of the tent.

"Dammit!" Coach yelled from the other side, examining a few more deceased members.

"No chocolate?" Nicked asked as he scribbled the words _CEDA SUCKS_ on the flimsy wall.  
Coach glared at him for a second but quickly dismissed it.

"You got that right," Rochelle smirked reading the message that Nick had left in sharpie. "Although at least CEDA tried."

"Try_ing._" Coach corrected her. "CEDA is trying, don't give up hope just yet."

"They're obviously trying very hard," Nick sighed, stepping over the corpse in front of him.

"What the hell is a safe house?" Coach asked lifting one of the papers from the desk.

"It's something to help provide people with materials to survive during a disaster, or so they say," Rochelle answered. "I don't think they ever actually had to do it though."

"What kinda supplies?" Nick said, finally looking interested.

"How the hell should I know?" Rochelle screeched. "Do I look like I work for them?"

"Well then next time _dear," _Nick sighed. "Don't bother answering if you don't have anything useful to say."

"What the hell…" Rochelle said quickly, looking annoyed and shocked at the same time. "What crawled up your ass?"

"Cuz, CEDA is gonna just up and traverse a zombie-filled city to leave some food and toilet paper for people to survive on their own?" Nick responded angrily. "That's about the dumbest shit I've heard all day."

"Hey watch how ya speak to her, ya hear?" Ellis shouted from behind them.

Coach stood there ignoring the bickering and continued reading the paper regarding safe houses intensely. Nick looked at Ellis and smiled.

"Uh oh, did I hit a soft spot?" He said walking past him and exiting the tent. "Tell me when you guys are done playing with papers; I'll be outside."

Ellis walked over to Rochelle and Coach did the same.

"Thanks," she said lightly. "I don't know what his problem is; his mood is like a coin toss."

"Jus' ignore him," Ellis stated. "He's a dick sometimes."

"Y'all gotta realize somethin," Coach began. "That man just watched you shoot the only person we actually thought wasn't infected."

Ellis looked down at the corpse of the CEDA employee who he had just shot.

"He was infected though," he stated, slightly confused.

"It's a bitch when you get your hopes up and have them shot down right in front of ya, literally or not," Coach continued.

Just as he finished, a loud inhumane scream startled the group followed by the sound of an assault rifle firing.

"Shit!" Ellis exclaimed, grabbing his shotgun and running out of the tent followed by Rochelle who drew her handgun.

Nick was firing into the distance.

"This one-armed freak is huge!" he yelled.

"Where is it?!" Rochelle asked in a panic, spotting it shortly after.

Nick ran around her setting himself against the wall of the tent aiming down the road.

The infected screamed again, it was far away.

"Jesus..." Ellis strained his eyes to make out the creature's physique.

It looked like a normal infected but the left side of its chest and arms had been horribly mutated. A few infected ran towards them from the distance drawn to the sound of the gunfire.

Nick fired continuously hitting a few that were very far away.

"Wait til they get closer," Ellis yelled at Nick. "Wastin all ya ammo!"

Nick looked at him and lifted the assault rifle, aiming it in his direction and his eyes grew wide for a moment as he inhaled his breath. Nick fired, hitting an infected that had snuck up behind Ellis.

Coach darted out of the tent and look around the area as the infected charged down the dirt road. It was completely dark now, and the flood lights near the tents were the only things illuminating the area.

"Don't worry there will be some in the _safe room_," Nick said sarcastically aiming his sights on the creature running at them.

It had charged him a lot faster than he expected, the distance between Nick and the deformed infected closed very fast. Diving to the side, the creature slammed into the tent ripping through the wall. For a moment it disappeared inside. Nick stood up aiming at the tent, Rochelle and Ellis fired at the tent blindly. Coach ran away from it, breathing heavily, lifting his UZI and firing it. Nick sprayed the tent with his assault rifle and the sound of the creature's death was one of the more satisfying moments of the evening.

The survivors moved towards the tent and examined the corpse of the crazed infected. Coach just sat down against the outside wall, with his hands on his head. Nick shot the dead creature two more times out of anger before walking out. Rochelle dug through her pocket taking out her Blackberry and fumbling through the applications on her phone.

"689-2471…" Ellis said nonchalantly.

Rochelle smiled only slightly, the mess of a corpse in front of them made it slightly hard. She snapped a picture of the body.

"You wanna name this one too?" she asked.

"Umm… it runs. Charger..." he answered. "Yeah, Charger."

Rochelle punched _charger_ into her phone as the label to the picture.

"Charger," she nodded. "Fitting."

"Look at that _tiny_ arm," Ellis said.

"Look at that _big _arm," she responded.

Ellis smiled and turned to meet the others.

"2471?" Rochelle asked from behind him.

The group got together and the flashlights went on.

"Oh, here," Ellis stated holding a handgun out towards Rochelle. "I picked it up back near that Hummer."

"Thanks," she replied tucking it into her waistband. "You grew up here in Savannah?"

"Born and raised," he replied. "You?"

"Oh, no. no. I'm actually from way north of here," she responded.

"Then whatcha doin' down here?" he asked.

The four walked together, Nick walking backwards keeping lookout behind them. The streets were completely dark and CEDA vans lined the sides. Another few tents were scattered off the roads. Ahead of them stood another barricade. A few buildings protruded ahead of them, they were closer to the town than expected.

"Well, remember how I told you I was a producer for WTTQ, Channel 10?" she sighed.

"Yup."

"That's not so much true..." she sounded slightly upset. "I was sent to produce a segment on the evacuation center here."

"So what's not true?"

"Well it was only because I was one of the only people left," she started. "People stopped showing up, people got sick, had it not been for that, I'd still be getting coffee for all the big-shots and carrying their bags."

"I see," Ellis pondered. "So what happen'?"

"I got down here, but before we even set up the cameras all hell broke loose," she said, letting out one long breath. "It was supposed to be my big break."

"It could still be your big break," Ellis replied with a smile. "You're immune, you're ahead a' the game."

"Hold up!" Coach snorted, raising his hand up for the group to stop.

He aimed his flashlight at the side of the road, revealing another tent.

"Should we check inside? Maybe get some more info about the magic rooms spread throughout the area?" Nick said sarcastically. The rest of the group was quiet, but moved towards it.

Ellis ran ahead of the group to the flapping doors of the soft white CEDA building. He lifted the material and shined his flashlight inside to reveal a figure in one of the same biohazard suits leaning against the wall adjacent to the entrance.

"Dang, we got another one—" he let out before the infected ran at him tackling him to the ground.

His handgun slid a few feet back as he hit the floor, slamming his back against the hard bulge of the shotgun strapped to his back. The infected snapped is jaws at him but to no avail as his face mask stopped it. The suit prevented the infected from being able to commit any bodily harm to him. Coach ran over to Ellis struggling with the infected pinning him down and let out a bit of a jolly laugh.

"This is comedy," he said watching Ellis struggle.

Rochelle smirked, but pulled out her hand gun.

"That's not…" she started, letting out a tiny laugh. "…funny."

Ellis planted his foot beneath the infected, kicking him off.

"Y'all are friggin' wonderful ya know?" he said, getting on his feet quickly, as the infected staggered to getting onto its own.

_Bam!_

Rochelle fired off a round hitting the infected in its chest, blood spurting through a small hole in its white suit. Then she lifted her second pistol and fired again, then two more times. Finally it fell back onto the floor writhing in place.

"I had that!" Ellis stated, dusting off the back of his pants.

Nick smiled and headed into the tent stopping in front of them.

"Jesus..." he said as he shined the flashlight around the room.

Multiple corpses, covered by the black body bags with labels on them stating CEDA in bold print and a bunch of fine print beneath it. Stretchers lined the walls; this tent was much longer than the previous one they had entered. An overturned desk lay next to the entrance.

"This is depressing..." Rochelle sighed.

"I guess they tried to treat the sick," Coach said shining his light at the multiple stretchers lying around inside.

"I guess those suits helped," Nick sneered.

"I need a camera," Rochelle said monotonously.

"I need a new shirt, and Nick needs some dice," Ellis followed. "Or was it cards...?"

Nick tried to hide his grin, but Ellis shined the light directly on his face.

"Cut it out," he said waving the light, cracking a smile.

"I wonder if Jimmy Gibbs is gonna be at the mall," Ellis wondered.

"Woooeee, Jimmy Gibbs!" Coach nodded. "He could drive us outta hea."

Coach lifted a paper off the floor next to sideways desk examining it. Nick pulled out the same marker that he had used before and began writing on the wall. _CEDA STILL SUCKS_

Rochelle snorted and Ellis shook his head laughing.

"Ya'll need some help," Coach scolded. "Neva in my life have I seen a buncha fools surrounded by dead bodies laughin' and crackin' jokes."

"So where we holdin' up tonight boss?" Nick cut him off, ignoring his statement.

"I'm tired, hopefully some place with a few beers..." Ellis remarked.

"It's not very descriptive about the locations of the safe houses," Coach answered. He dropped the paper on the floor, taking out his Uzi.

"Again with these fuckin' miracle rooms ya think we'd look for an evac center?" Nick said shaking his head. "Let's go. Let's just go."

The four quickly exited the tent and began heading up the street towards the first buildings ahead of them. Nick still walked backwards, watching behind them. Thunder crashed in the distance, and strikes of lightning began to appear ahead of them.

"Oh shit," Rochelle said abruptly. "I really don't want to get wet."

"_Sure_ ya don't," Nick grinned.

"Maybe the zombies will chase the lightning?" Ellis said, hurrying his pace a bit.

"I don't think they're that stupid Ellis," Coach responded.

"Well they ain't that smart!"

The first building ahead of them was four stories tall, the wall, covered in spray paint, depicted a small house with a cross in the middle with an arrow point up.

"We getting close to a church?" Nick asked. "We can go pray, seeing as it worked for everyone else in the church we passed through earlier."

"That's the same picture that was on the paper I was reading!" Coach yelled, almost excited.

"Ya know," Nick said sounding aggravated. "Don't even say the damn words."

"Safe house?" Ellis asked, as Nick palmed his face and shook his head.

"Let's just check out this building," Coach said, heading towards the doors. "Maybe we can find something to eat."

Ellis' perked his head up like a dog.

"Shut up!" Coach yelled. "Y'all hear that?"

"Oh my God, I think..." Nick responded. "It's an ice cream truck!"

Coach ignored the comment as usual and gripped his weapon. Ellis pulled out his handgun and aimed it and his flashlight down the road. A few raindrops were falling now and the clouds were rolling in much faster with the winds picking up. A low growl came from behind a car which had been embedded into the side of a tractor trailer. Rochelle gripped both of her pistols and aimed at the car as well.

"I know that sound," she whispered.

"Hunter?" Ellis asked.

"Hunter."

Before they could move to check it out, the hunter pounced from behind the car up into the air directly at them.

"Shit!" Nick yelled, struggling to aim at the airborne target.

"Move!" Coach yelled.

Rochelle fired repeatedly into the air, hitting the hunter several times. Ellis ran forward towards it, passing beneath it so it wouldn't land on him. Nick sprayed the sky in attempt to hit it. Successfully, the body of the hunter slammed against the floor, sliding a few feet behind them. Nobody had a chance to say a word before everyone started moving into the building, and the screams of infected could be heard.

"Here we go," Nick sighed.

"Get inside!" Coach barked at the group. "Inside, inside!"

Coach turned the knob and charged into the building, the others followed behind him. Nick pulled the double doors closed as he entered the lobby.

"What the hell?" Rochelle stated, less scared, more confused.

"I wish I could jump that high. That'd be so _cool_." Ellis said seemingly not phased, or at least he seemed to be unaware of the situation.

Dozens of infected bodies dressed the room nicely, all the furniture was positioned upright against the wall with the entrance they just came through. All windows were blocked, with a mesh of tables, chairs, and a bed.

"Where did that bed come from?" Nick asked as he looked around the room.

The quiet lobby was almost empty without all the furniture in its rightful place. Aside from the corpses around the room, bullet holes lined the walls accordingly.

"We gotta move quickly!" Coach yelled. "Maybe we can catch up to whoever shot these guys."

"Maybe they can shoot the stupid out of you?" Nick replied. "Nobody is left remember?"

As he finished his sentence two gunshots came from above them, muffled through the floor.

"I knew it!" Ellis yelled, tugging Rochelle's hand for a second and running towards the staircase.

"I'll be damned." Nick ate his words.

The group ran up the stairs, and the infected banged viciously on the stairs downstairs entrance.

"What floor did those gunshots come from?" Coach asked, running out of breath.

"This one!" Rochelle responded, happily reaching the top of the steps. Nick ran ahead of the group while Coach trailed behind.

"Be careful though—" Coach started.

Just as he was about to finish his sentence, Nick turned the corner into the closest room and a stray bullet pierced his left arm.

"GOD DAMMIT!" He yelled gripping his arm.

"Oh shit!" a female voice yelled from in front of him.

"Stupid bitch!" Nick lifted his assault rifle and fired into the dark room.

Two bullets came out before the clip was empty. Coach grabbed Nick and pulled him out of the doorway. Ellis ran over to him and asked to look at his arm.

"Don't shoot!" Rochelle yelled.

"We're immune!" Coach added.

"I'm so sorry!" The voice responded. "I thought he was a zombie!"

A tall Caucasian woman appeared in the doorway. "Is he okay?!"

"No, some stupid blind_ asshole_ just shot me!" Nick responded angrily.

"I deserved that," she answered. "My name is Analise, and there should be some medical supplies in the safe house ahead."

Nick bit his tongue.

"I told you they was real!" Coach said excitedly. "Safe houses!"

The sounds of the infected slamming the doors downstairs had stopped.

"Let's go, the others are probably worried sick about me," Analise said putting away her handgun and running away.

"Others?" Rochelle asked rhetorically.

"Maybe they got food!" Coach yelled.

"Thank the good Lord!" Ellis exclaimed as he chased after Analise. "C'mon y'all!"


	4. Make Up Your Mind Already

**Thanks for the reviews everybody, I appreciate it, and the messages. If you're bored with my fic, and want to read a better one, **

**then you should definitely check out Wildarms Left 4 Dead fic, he's the only reason I chose to do a L4D2 one. :]**

**Oh and R/R, I greatly appreciate it. Thanks a lot guys. :)**

* * *

Ellis, Nick, Coach, and Rochelle all stood quietly in the small safe room. It was divided into two areas, both small in size. The lone window on the side had been boarded up, even though it was on the second floor. The safe room had been an office, but the desks were rearranged, and a pile of computer monitors lay in the corner on top of an endless amount of wires, keyboards and computer mouses. The chipped grayish paint peeled around the edges of the ceiling and dust occupied most of the air. The entrance to the safe room had been removed and replaced with a deadbolt cast iron door. It was quite clear that CEDA had set up the room; many posters and and pictures stated '_Clean hands save lives!' _And '_In case of infection:__…__' _ The four pushed the vending machine across the room and placed it against the entrance, blocking it entirely. The door to the other half of the room opened slightly and Analise, in her white button down business outfit, slipped through and pulled it shut.

"Hi," she said weakly.

"Hi," Rochelle said, annoyed at the fact that she had to have a 'meeting' with the other survivors before they were allowed inside.

"We have come to a conflict in interest it seems," she said

"Yeah, and who's _we_?" Nick interrogated, as he adjusted the dressing on his wound and grunted in pain. A little bit of blood began to seep through it.

"My team, my friends," Analise began sternly. "Y'all say you're immune. Correct?"

"Do I look like a zombie?" Rochelle retorted.

"I understand, but that means you've had... uh, physical contact with the infected. Yes?" Analise continued.

"You're telling me that you and your friends have spent all this time and not one of you had gotten at least scratched?" Coach barked.

"Can you get ta' the point, Susan-Rita-whatever your name is?" Nick sighed. "We've had plenty of _contact_ with the zombies. Yet we're still here."

Coach swallowed a bite that he had hardly chewed of the candy bar he had taken from the broken vending machine.

"We're immune," he said, taking another bite.

"You're carriers," Analise snapped. "Carriers which can still infect others, like us."

"Oh c'mon, how would you even know that?" Ellis laughed.

"Because these idiots still think it's a damn flu," Nick stated, walking up to Analise as she stepped back a bit against the door. "Don't worry babe; it's not airborne."

Nick slid his hand across his wound and flicked the little bit of blood on the floor in front of him.

"You know_ nothing_ about this." Analise snapped.

Coach chewed his last bite and threw the wrapper on the floor. Rochelle moved quickly past him, stepping on it.

"And what might _you_ know?" she spat out.

"I know that the La Grange Hotel is being used to evacuate all CEDA employees _only,_" Analise sighed. "And what is that _you_ know again? Oh that's right. Nothing."

"When did she become such a bitch!" Ellis said laughingly.

Nick smiled at Ellis momentarily but gave it up.

"Sweetheart, how do you know they're still evacuating _anybody_?" he said, walking back towards the vending machine, scooping up a bag of Doritos.

"They just are. Trust me," she said. "If you care about your friends, you'll take them to the La Grange."

"CEDA employees only; how does that help all of us?" Coach questioned.

"Well, it helps _us_, but you guys would have to figure something out."

"What? So you're gonna shoot at us and then basically tell us to go screw ourselves when we're the only living things left in the city practically?" Rochelle said quickly in one long breath.

"We are _not_ the only ones left in the city," Analise argued. "We most certainly are not."

Ellis stood up and grinned at Nick who began chewing on a handful of Doritos.

"Holy shit! Nick you're a zombie!"

"Ellis...what-" Rochelle started but trailed off.

"I mean ya got scratched. Bam, that right there is infection!" Ellis said in an extremely excited manner. "And then-you got shot!"

"This boy is on some serious medication." Coach rambled.

"And you're still alive! You're a zombie!" Ellis laughed. "This is so _cool_. I know a zombie... this is eff'n _sweet_."

Analise stared blankly and Nick just shrugged his shoulders at her.

"Then again, my buddy Keith, he once played a prank on our pals girlfriend in a cemetery, and well, he got shot, and lived." Ellis stated. "But he wasn't no zombie- this was before the infection."

"I can't tell if this boy is mocking me, or if he really is just plain stupid." Analise shook her head in disbelief.

"Watch your mouth," Nick said angrily at Analise. "The only person here that can make fun of Ellis is me."

"Careful Nick, she might shoot you again," Ellis remarked, making Nick smile. "Then again it wouldn't _kill_ you anyway!"

Nick's smile disappeared and he shook his head at him.

"All this unnecessary animosity towards me. Look, I don't understand how you guys can be so not serious about this right now!" Analise yelled. "We are leaving in two hours; we'll divvy up the supplies in the safe room."

"Leaving in two hours? So we ain't goin togetha?" Coach questioned.

"I'm sorry, we just can't stick with carriers, too great of a risk," she remarked. "And yeah... sorry about your arm."

Nick proceeded to slit her throat with his eyes as she opened up the door and went back into the separate room. He could make out a tall older male wearing a black outfit with a small white name badge before the door shut.

"Well what the hell do we do now?" Nick said, punching the door.

"We're goin' to the hotel," Coach answered.

Ellis, dumbfounded, shook his head. "Naw, Coach there's zombies everywhere, what hotel's gonna be open?"

"Well, I guess the hotel is a helluva lot closer than the docks," Rochelle said.

"Well get to sleep everyone; I'll keep watch for now." Nick ordered. "We leave first thing in the morning."

It was probably around 4:15 when Ellis' eyes shot open from the sound of the metal door slamming one room away. Lying on the cold wooden floor, his arm under his head did not help much to sooth the discomfort. He looked over at Coach, who was sitting up against the wall snoring away, and Rochelle who was cuddling with the CEDA-issued Medical Pack almost in fetal position against an overturned desk. Ellis stood up, stretching quietly trying not to wake the others. Nick wasn't anywhere in sight. He moved towards the door to the conjoined safe room and opened it slightly.

"Nick," Ellis whispered.

Nick was in the next room, he was dressing his wound once again, the old bloodied bandage had been tossed aside.

"Why are you awake?" Nick asked without taking his focus off his arm as he attempted to do multiple things at once with medical tape. His arm was covered in blood and a small pool of blood surrounded a mangled bullet on the floor.

"I dunno, probably somthin' ta'do with the whole zombie apocalypse thing goin' on," Ellis answered, watching Nick struggle with one arm to wrap the other. "Hey, maybe you should take your suit jacket off."

"You have no idea how much this suit costs, kid." Nick said, becoming frustrated with the bandage and tossing it on the ground.

"Sure I do," Ellis laughed. "I had a suit just like that, and it was white too!"

"Oh yeah?"

"Yup, for my first holy communion."

"You're an idiot." Nick said as he shook his head. "You gonna help me out here or just watch?"

"Oh! Yeah, my bad."

Nick was searching the room for a place to hang his suit jacket. He decided on the leg of a large table which had been flipped sideways, took off his jacket and placed it on the edge, not allowing it to touch the floor. He then moved away and started unraveling some more medical tape. Ellis hurried over and picked up Nick's jacket and started putting it on.

"What the f- What are you doing?!" Nick yelled almost.

"Nick it's _ripped! _What does it even matter?"

"This suit costs more than your house! Put it down!"

"Maybe monthly, but not all together, naw I got a pretty nice house I think."

Ellis took the tape from Nick and lifted his arm. "At least I had a nice house..."

"Easy, I wasn't just shot or anything," Nick said sarcastically, biting his lip.

"Man this shit's still bleeding like crazy."

"It should be I just dug the bullet out..."

"Man, we gotta close this up before you bleed to death."

"These medical kits don't have anything in them, they're damn near useless." Nick sighed.

"You don't need a med-pack, you got a lighter?"

"It's in my jacket pocket, take it out, and take it off and hang it on the damn table!"

Ellis did what he was told, and found the lighter, also feeling a large bump in the pocket.

"Dude you got smokes?!"

"Yeah, don't tell the others, I don't need anybody grubbin' off me."

"Can I get one please?" Ellis begged.

"Fine, light one for me and let's do what we gotta do already."

Ellis quickly lit two of the Marlboro Reds and handed one to Nick, then proceeded to pull out his own lighter.

"Why did you need a lighter if you had one?"

"Stop askin' questions you're making my head hurt."

Nick was taken aback by the remark. Ellis handed his lighter to him.

"You got a knife?"

"Yes..."

"Well gimme it."

Nick didn't ask why and handed Ellis his knife.

"You should sit down, we're gonna be here for a bit."

"Alright, now you're gonna tell me what you're trying to do," Nick demanded.

"Sealing the cut," Ellis answered. "Obviously."

Nick inhaled the smoke of his cigarette and seemed to never let it out and closed his eyes just thinking about the pain awaiting him in the next few minutes.

"This is easy, me and my buddy were hunting once, and well he shot me right the behind," Ellis laughed. "I was so mad, now that I think about it I might still have a scar, wanna see?"

Ellis gripped his belt buckle.

"Easy Slick, keep your pants on. So why did you need to cauterize your own wound anyway?"

"Well I couldn't let my ma find out, she'd kill me and I ain't got no medical 'surance."

"Uh huh... well let's get this done I suppose..."

After about five minutes or so of Nick and Ellis repeatedly lighting their lighters warming the metal blade Ellis stood up and positioned himself over him.

"Okay, get ready on my count down," Ellis lifted the burning hot knife.

"Three, two-" Before he said one he slammed the side of the blade against Nicks wound.

Nick screamed loudly this time.

"JESUS CHRIST!" he yelled as he jerked back and forth a little.

"Oh don't be a baby."

"You didn't even count to one!"

"Well I didn't wanna let the blade cool down..."

"Holy shit, oh my god! This hurts more than taking the bullet out. Shit."

"Quick, gimme that med-pack," Ellis said reaching over.

Nick slid the pack across the floor and Ellis looked around in it. Pulling out a small bottle of rubbing alcohol, he opened the cap and just doused the wound quickly. Nick bit his lip and didn't yell, he just made a fist and punched Ellis in the arm as hard as possible with his good arm. The wound fizzed up like a shaken bottle of cola.

"What the hell man!" Ellis yelled. "I'm just helpin' you out here!"

The conjoined safe room door busted open ad Rochelle and Coach appeared, Coach very groggy. Both had their pistols drawn. Rochelle was first to put down her gun.

"What the hell's goin' on, y'all okay?" she asked as Ellis was scrounging through the med-pack.

"I _was_, until fuckin' Cleetus over here decided to seal my damn bullet wound. If we run into that Sarah bitch I'm breaking both her kneecaps and leaving her for dead, so help me God.."

"Sarah-who? What? And Ellis did what?" Rochelle gasped.

"Stand still, let me fix ya up," Ellis said as he wrapped Nicks arm and bit off a piece of medical tape.

"We're all up now, so we should get movin' to that hotel," Coach said, rubbing his eyes. "Where are the supplies?"

"Sure, why not, I don't think I'll be able to fall asleep now," Nick remarked. "Over there in the black duffel bag."

Coach hurried over to the corner, unzipping the black bag.

"There isn't much in there," Nick stated. "We either weren't the first ones here, or Melissa and her friends robbed us."

"Analise?" Rochelle asked very confused. "You don't think..."

"I don't trust her or her mysterious team that refused to acknowledge our existence," he responded. "We may have gotten screwed."

"We made it this far without anything, and at least there's a whole lot of medical supplies," Coach said optimistically. "Let's get moving."

"Um, if you wanna play Florence Nightingale, then go right ahead." Nick said angrily. "I'm not lugging around anything that'll slow us down."

"Alright so we got no ammo but a ton of med-packs... this sucks!" Rochelle blurted out angrily.

"Ro, take it easy, you didn't expect to find an arsenal lying around did you?" Coach asked as he walked over to the door. "Once we are outside, keep ya voices down."

"Someone got tape for Ellis' mouth?" Nick laughed as he pressed against the safe room door, ready to proceed back into the building.

Rochelle loaded her last few bullets, while Nick did the same in his revolver, sighing as he parted with his empty assault rifle and opened the door.

The four quietly rushed through the next room which was only littered with a few corpses and desks. Down the stairs and around the corner they made their way to the back entrance leading behind the building. The rain had lightened since they entered the building hours ago.

"I hope this alley cuts through," Coach said leading the group.

The sun was just starting to show behind the buildings encasing them. Nothing in plain sight but they moved with caution regardless, each of them aiming everywhere possible. They moved quickly through the small alleyway between two smaller buildings. Approaching the street they halted due to the growing sound of infected nearby.

"We gonna turn left and cross the street," Coach whispered. "Stay tight, cover each other."

The survivors ran out onto the street as many infected growled as they perked their heads up and began running at them.

Ellis fired behind him, hitting the nearest infected which snapped at him. The numbers of infected grew larger for every one they shot down, it seemed. Rochelle ran straight at one infected and body checked it to the floor and kept running. Coach surprisingly kept up with Ellis, albeit out of breath.

"I'm out!" Nick yelled to the group as he caught up with Rochelle who was speeding past everybody with a trail of infected. The entire street consisted of small houses and a few stores, every window and door in sight had been boarded up. Aside from the wooden boards covering every available entrance to the houses, and the countless infected baring their teeth at the group, it looked as if disaster hasn't struck this area. No overturned cars, no fires burning, not even a broken mailbox in sight.

One infected caught up to Nick, throwing his arm at him.

"Nick!" Ellis yelled to him.

He spun around and threw his empty revolver at it, hitting it in the face. It didn't seem to mind and it stumbled for a second and continued after him.

"Over there!" Rochelle screamed over the infected's yells and groans.

She pointed to a black and gray Chevy Silverado on the opposite side of the street. An infected woman, with ragged clothes covered in dried blood, darted out in front of Ellis and he shoved her, but was halted for a second—a second too long. Another infected ran up behind him, grabbed onto his shoulders, and threw him on the floor. Two more infected that were following Coach headed toward Ellis. Rochelle jumped onto the hood of the Silverado. Nick turned and ran towards Ellis who was struggling with the infected, scratching at him while he was down. One infected didn't seem to even be interested in biting him as he just clawed at his chest violently. Nick ran and charged into one of the infected, tackling it off of Ellis and he began to swing his fist repeatedly into its face. It was to no avail as more infected began catching up, and another grabbed him and pulled him down as well.

"Shit!" Coach yelled as he pulled himself up onto the pickup, Rochelle hopping on to the roof and took aim.

"Cover me!" Rochelle yelled as she fired both pistols at the infected attacking Nick and Ellis.

Two infected ran up to the vehicle and tried clawing at Coach who responded with two shots to the head. He took a few steps back and slipped on a few small metal pipes which rolled away from him to the other side of the pickup bed. Ellis struggled alongside Nick, wrestling with the infected around them. Rochelle picked off the ones that ran towards them while they were on the ground. Coach picked up one of the metal pipes and swung at another infected climbing up onto the back with a satisfying crunch as he connected with the poor individuals face.

Nick planted his feet under the infected in a way so that he was able to kick it off. He staggered to his feet as a few more infected charged at them as Ellis still struggled, letting out yells whenever he had a chance to breathe.

"Nick!" Coach yelled as he threw the metal pipe towards him. It clanged against the floor and rolled a bit. Nick instinctively scooped it up and gripped it with two hands. An infected ran up to him and he swung, but it was on the floor before he could hit it thanks to Rochelle's shots. He ran forward and kicked the bloody infected woman and began to swing the pipe mercilessly. Rochelle hopped off the pickup and ran over as less infected were in the area. She fired at one closing distance on them taking it out in one shot. Nick plowed through the infected and held out his hand.

"Ho-ly shit..." Ellis said, gripping Nick's hand. "I thought I was done."

He was covered in blood, some his, but mainly from the several dead infected around them.

"Hey Nick," Coach said, hobbling over to him signifying that his leg had begun to hurt again. "You swing that pipe pretty damn good for someone who just got shot in the arm."

"Hey Nick," Ellis said weakly. "I know you ain't want us to be grubbin off ya... but-"

Nick had already pulled out his pack of Reds and lit one up and handed it to him before he finished.

"Thanks man."

He then lit one for himself.

"You okay sweetie?" Rochelle asked putting her hand on Ellis' shoulder.

"I'm fine." Ellis said taking a pull of his Red. "Hey, look at all them-there houses."

"Looks like these people had plenty of time to prepare," Rochelle nodded. "I wonder if they've been evacuated..."

"I think we just killed most of them," Nick said pessimistically. "Nobody getting evac'd here."

"No, that can't be true, none of these homes look broken into," Ellis stated looking at all the windows and doors. "These people, at least some of them, got outta here."

"Well the evac center in the square was totally overrun when I was there," Rochelle stated. "That leaves two more, one at Liberty Mall, and one, ah shit I forgot the other one. Hopefully they held up better."

Coach put his hands out to silence everybody. "Look, we ain't goin' to no mall, we ain't goin' to no docks, we are goin' to the hotel, it's close, and if they're getting people outta heah then by all means we gonna try."

"How close is close exactly Coach?" Rochelle asked.

"Close enough, we can be there in less than an hour if we hurry," he answered and moved over to the pick up, grabbing two more small pipes. Ellis took one from him.

"I wish somebody could evacuate me to Vegas," Nick grunted, flicking his cigarette. "Hell, I'll even settle for Atlantic City at this point."


	5. In Case of emergency

**Thanks guys :) Somehow managed to survive the last few weeks of school and work and stuff. I'll update a lot quicker next time. Sorry about that. Read and review if you'd be so kind :P**

* * *

The entrance to the La Grange hotel had been occupied by many people at one point. Footprints of mud, blood and who knows what else stained the floor. Although it seemed empty, the usual chairs and floral decorations occupied the lobby. A slew of corpses up against the wall behind the receptionist's desk made the formerly peaceful lobby sinister. The four survivors' noses crinkled as the odor caused their stomachs to turn. The fire alarm was going off—it wasn't loud at all surprisingly—but the flashing white lights spaced out every 20 feet made it very clear that there was a fire in the building.

"The hell is this?" Coach grumbled as he halted.

The small corridor from the lobby to the elevators was completely barricaded with furniture from the rooms on the first floor. Coach stood in front of a large map of the hotel trying to find a way through the hotel, while Nick leaned against the entrance keeping watch for any infected that might approach the building. Ellis stood against the wall, if you could call it standing. More like the wall was supporting him. Ellis was hurt from the previous encounter with the horde of infected. It was clear, nothing serious, but he had a visible dark circle around his left eye from where one infected had punched him, a small gash on his upper cheek. His hat, which he managed to keep on his head, was stained with grease and blood. His black undershirt which he was wearing now was torn and bloodied, several scratches and bruises covered his ribs. He'd never seen so much blood in his life—his undershirt was beginning to solidify in areas were the blood had begun to coagulate. Even more blood had dripped down his arms, stomach and chest, distorting the tattoo on his bicep.

"I still think you're cute, don't worry," Rochelle said dryly as she walked over and leaned on the wall next to him; he showed a small smirk and closed his eyes.

Rochelle was exhausted. They all were, but she showed it the most. Though not covered in blood and though her clothes were intact, she looked as if she just wanted to lay down and quit. She slid down the wall and rested for a moment. Her Depeche Mode shirt was in near perfect condition. Unfortunately for her, she hated that band; she once mentioned that it was "just some screaming with instruments." She rested her head against Ellis' thigh as she thought about the future of the group. They made it to the hotel, now just need to get to the roof and get on a chopper and get away from it all. All she wanted was to be relaxing on a beach. She moved her hand behind her head and removed the clasp holding up her hair. It fell down to her shoulders were she moved for a second to let it fall into its rightful place. She leaned back against Ellis' leg and closed her eyes once again. He glanced over at her and put his hand behind her head and stroked her hair slowly.

"The fuck, _y'all_ look like the cover to some shitty _depression_ band right now," Nick said. "Wake up we are almost out of here."

"You're showin yer age Nick, what the hell's a depression band?" Ellis choked out, then laughed a bit, followed by a painful cough.

"What are we going to do?" She sighed. "Did you even contemplate the idea that they're only evacuating CEDA employees?"

Nick pulled off the last piece of tape from under his jacket and tossed the bloodied bandage onto the floor, stretching his arm out freeing himself, feeling as if he just took a straight jacket off.

"So what, maybe if we get _Ay-liss_ some new clothes they won't think he's a zombie?" he grinned.

Ellis looked worn out as ever, but still managed to look up at him and smile. "Nick, we already discussed this, _you're_ the zombie, _remember_?"

Ellis finished his sentence and sunk to his knees with his back against the wall.

"Shit, Ellis, you're really screwed up," Rochelle said.

Nick extended his arm to lend Ellis a hand.

"Naw I'm good," Ellis let out weakly.

"Kid c'mon, we gotta move and I really don't feel like leaving you here," Nick stated.

Ellis grabbed Nick's hand and pulled himself up into an upright position. Suddenly his vision started to get very hazy. Gripping Nick's hand, he didn't let go as his vision left him and then he fell.

He fell towards Nick who grabbed him and struggled to hold him up as Ellis' knees buckled completely. His hat bounced about two feet away.

"Fuck," Nick let out kind of shocked that Ellis just blacked out so suddenly. "Help me keep him up!"

"Oh my gosh, no…" Rochelle gasped.

"Oh shit..." Coach exclaimed as he ran over to the group.

He positioned himself beside Ellis on the opposite side and placed his motionless arm around him, Nick did the same.

"What happened?!" Coach asked nervously.

"I-I dunno he just passed out!" Rochelle exclaimed.

"Mark! Mark..." A crackling female's voice came from a radio encased in the pile of rotting corpses behind the receptionist's desk.

Rochelle instinctively ran towards the body pile and started examining all the corpses. The voice was coming from one of the hotel employees' walkie-talkies. A police officer was slouched over the young bellhop and Rochelle squinted her eyes in disgust as she shoved the body to the side. A small handgun landed on the floor, the cop was holding it originally.

"It's Analise," she said, her voice cutting in and out. "We made—the roof."

"It's that bitch!" Nick yelled. "Daniella or whatever..."

"She just said 'Analise' Nick!" Rochelle snarled.

"We gon' get to that roof _right_ now," Coach ordered as he gripped Ellis' side with his free hand.

Rochelle scrambled to her feet, lifting the corpse's handgun and running to the others, looking at Ellis, whose head hung down low. She moved behind them scooping up Ellis' hat and placing it on her own head.

"I got y'all covered, let's move," Rochelle stated as she checked the clip to count how many shots she had left.

Nick and Coach carried Ellis into the next room while Rochelle led the group. There was a door in the back leading into the catering hall, which was empty as well, besides a few corpses.

"Mark..." Analise spoke through the walkie-talkie of yet another employee's lifeless corpse. "Th- thing can be avo- not too smart."

Analise's broken voice was trembling and you can tell even through the walkie-talkies.

"What the fuck does that mean?" Nick asked, struggling to keep Ellis up. "Jesus this boy feels heavier than _you _look."

Coach ignored Nick's comment as usual.

"Oh man," Rochelle said hesitantly. "We got fire."

"Gee, the fire alarms weren't lying after all." Nick responded as he continually struggled to carry Ellis with Coach.

The door to the kitchen wasn't open but little bits of smoke trickled through. Rochelle ran ahead and pushed through the doors slowly letting in a billow of smoke. The kitchen was filled it. Rochelle covered her mouth with her shirt and proceeded through. The fire was small and only occupied the left side of the room. Analise's shaky voice faded behind them, rambling about Mark, one of the other survivors she had been with. The fire started to spread; it slowly covered several stoves and moved onto the refrigeration unit. Their exit was ahead of them, and the fire was not getting to it in time for it to be a problem. They pushed onwards through the large double doors, the smell of rotting flesh and melting plastic filled the air. They reached the hallway and began to backtrack towards the front of the hotel where the path had been blocked off on the opposite side. A small security office was next to the elevators. Rochelle pressed the 'L' button and the numbers above the doors began to light up. It was on the thirteenth floor and began to descend.

"This is intense," Nick said, trying to make light of the horrible situation.

"We almost outta hear," Coach said. "I don't care what we have to do, we're getting on that chopper."

Just then the crackle of yet another walkie-talkie filled the air.

"Mark, get to – roof," Analise cried out. "Stay away-- eenth floor-- Huge!"

"What floor did she say?" Nick asked, knowing he wasn't going to get an answer.

"I don't know," Rochelle answered. "I don't care actually, we're going straight to the roof."

The elevator was on the fifth floor now and they waited, when a small explosion shook the room.

"Shit. This place isn't gonna get any better," Nick let out, slightly startled.

"Stay away- - to the roof!" Analise yelled.

"I'm just gonna shut her up myself," Nick sighed. "I'm going to beat her face with a lead pipe in the dining room, so help me God."

Rochelle laughed slightly. "Alright Colonel Mustard, the elevator is here."

Just as Rochelle finished her sentence the elevator door dinged and slid open. A lone male infected turned quickly from inside and snarled at her before letting out a scream as it ran for her.

"Shit!" she yelled firing the handgun hitting it in the throat as a spurt of blood landed on the wall inside the elevator.

The infected practically ignored it and ran at her again, with another shot she dismissed him, decorating the elevator with a nice reddish paint.

The survivors stepped inside as the peaceful elevator music played softly through the speakers in the ceiling. She pressed the 'door close' button.

"Ellis..." Nick said quietly, trying to shake him gently while on his shoulder.

Coach just stood by silently supporting his body weight with Nick.

"Set him down," Rochelle said after pressing the 25 button.

She knelt in front of Ellis as soon as the two guys sat him up against the wall.

"You need to wake up right now!" she cried out, grabbing the bloody remnants of what used to be a decently fitting undershirt and shaking him, his breathing was not heavy but it was steady and his pulse was fine.

The elevator passed the fourth and fifth floor.

"Shee-it!" Ellis yelled, his eyes snapping open around the seventh floor.

"Welcome back boy!" Coach exclaimed happily.

"Oh thank God!" Rochelle sighed, very relieved.

Niiiick!" Ellis laughed and then coughed.

"What?" Nick said nonchalantly, trying to hide the fact that he was pretty happy Ellis was awake.

"Did you carry me?" Ellis smiled, laughing, followed by another cough. "I know I'm irresistible and all that, but... I think Coach coulda done it all on his own."

"What the hell does that mean?" Nick replied angrily.

"You just wanted to touch me I reckon," Ellis said with a wink.

"I know what you meant you raging idiot!" Nick yelled at him. The ninth floor passed by.

Rochelle smacked Ellis on the chest and stood up.

"Ellis, boy we thought we was gonna have to leave your ass," Coach smiled.

"I feel like I just got hit by a bus Coach," Ellis replied. "But I ain't dead yet.

Nick paced back and forth as the 13th floor went by.

"Claire's on the roof, and she's babbling like a psycho about some guy named Mark," he informed Ellis. "And something about something on one of the floors."

"The one person we actually run into and you can't remember her name," Rochelle said, slightly annoyed.

"Ya know," Ellis started. "One time, Keith and I were in an elevator, and he lit up a cigarette... and the sprinklers went on... and well, we almost dro-"

"Ellis..." Nick said loudly.

"What?" he questioned.

"Nothing... good to have you back," Nick sighed, turning his head towards the wall.

"Well yeah, like I was saying," Ellis continued. "We almost drowned! And Keith he ain't no swimmer, he's built like one, but well- he's like a rock in water, he can't ever stay aflo-"

The elevator dinged 15 and passed it up, suddenly a loud bang shook the elevator and it came to a complete stop.

"Ah what the hell!" Ellis yelled. "Can't I ever finish a story?"

"Ellis, sweetie, this'll have to wait," Rochelle said nervously.

The lights in the elevator shut down completely, leaving them in pitch darkness only to be greeted by a nice blinding flash of the fire alarm light, every few seconds.

"Shit! Whatta we gonna do now?"

"I hate elevators," Nick said very quietly. "We have to get out."

Ellis took out his lighter and flicked it a few times, illuminating a small area around the elevators button console. Coach squeezed past Rochelle and him and started pressing the emergency door open button. To no avail, the elevator doors remained closed. Nick quickly pulled out his knife and slid it between the doors attempting to pry it open. He twisted and pushed and tried to make them open but was greeted by a slightly violent snap of his blade.

"Shit! God dammit!" Nick yelled.

Ellis handed his lighter, still lit, slowly to Rochelle and pulled his own knife out and stuck it between the doors.

"Where y'all getting these knives from?" Rochelle asked.

Nobody answered.

"What about the vent?" Coach asked looking upwards. "Lord knows I ain't climbin though."

"No, hey, look," Ellis said as he struggled. The doors opened just a bit. "Help me out here."

Coach slid his fingers between the doors, and Ellis dropped the knife and did the same. They both pulled, Nick helping Ellis, Rochelle helping Coach but doing the same. The doors screeched as they opened slowly. Wide enough to fit at least two of Coach, they left the doors alone.

The elevator was stuck between what appeared to be the fifteenth and sixteenth floor, only a small portion of the fifteenth floor exposed through the opening along the floor.

"Can't anything go right for us?" Rochelle groaned, checking her handgun.

"It's pretty dark down there," Coach sighed. "Looks like we crawling."

Ellis slid through quickly without hesitation, landing gracefully and standing up.

"Jesus! Be careful!" Coach yelled.

"Kids..." Nick sighed as he got down and crawled through, hopping down onto the fifteenth floor.

He landed and fell forward, to assure he did not fall into the open elevator shaft behind him.

Ellis was already looking around the hall for infected.

_Ding. _No longer was the hall dim and bathed only in sunlight and the occasional flashes of the scattered fire alarms, but the lights blinked back on, almost in unison.

"Damn, step back!" Nick yelled to Rochelle who was about to climb down next."

The sound of infected could be heard moving along the floor they were on.

"Nick," Ellis said. "What the-"_  
_

The lights flickered for a moment before settling, on. The elevator doors did not close, but began to ascend, closing the small gap that had allowed Ellis and Nick to escape. Rochelle panicked and tossed her handgun between the doors as it shut.

"Dammit, dammit, dammit!" Rochelle repeated as she lifted her hand to slam the emergency stop button.

Several gunshots could be heard from the very gun she had thrown them as the elevator slowly climbed the shaft.

"No!" Coach said grabbing her hand. "Do you know how those emergency stop buttons work?"

"No..."

"Well neither do I, and I aint about to get stuck in no elevata' twice."

The doors closed rather slowly as it settled. Rochelle pressed the now illuminated 17 button.

"Ro, they'll be fine," Coach stated, trying to comfort her. "We'll just loop back around, head down the stairs and meet them."

"What if they get in another elevator?"

"We'll find them."

"But, Ellis is hurt."

"That boy is blind to the seriousness of the situation," Coach grumbled. "He's a good kid and he can handle his own for a bit."

"You better be right."

"Ro, that boy will be the one taking care of Nick. Don't you worry."

"This is our floor," Coach said. "I always hated the number 17."

_Ding_. The doors slid open slowly.

"Man, my knee is killing m-" Coach stopped his sentence and put his hand to his ear as he heard something. A low helpless crying, coming from far away sent a shiver down his spine.

"Someone's alive?" Rochelle asked, looking at Coach, then poking her head out of the elevator.

She lifted Ellis' hat, which depicted a small blue tow truck and turned it backwards placing it on her head again.

"Aw, dammit, where's my hat at?" Ellis questioned angrily, brushing his hand through his now exposed, relatively short brown hair.

"Not sure, but at least you got Ro's gun." Nick responded eagerly holding out his hand signifying that he wanted to have it.

"Get the hell outta here," Ellis snarled. "You're going to take away our last chance to play in the _LARGEST SHOOTING RANGE EVER_?"

"You're insane," Nick sighed. "I'm starting to think you where never hurt to begin with."

The halls were lit nicely, and the sun had risen to cover the sky in a soft orange glow, breaking through the windows along their path. The halls seemed nearly empty, few corpses scattered sparsely. Many of them lined with bullets, to match the awkwardly aimed shots that decorated the floral wallpaper design. Many of the doors were closed, the few that were open, were opened with force.

"Should we check them rooms there?" Ellis asked. "Or head up to the next floor?"

"No, we get to the roof is what we do."

Nick walked over to the elevator near them and pressed the call button.

"But what if they come looking for us?"

"They aren't that stupid overalls," Nick replied. "They'll meet us on the roof."

Ellis tapped his foot, slightly agitated and touched his bloody torn shirt, which barely covered up the dried blood all over his upper body.

"Nick I'll be right back," He sighed, taking off into the closest room, opening the door cautiously. "I Can't wear this anymore."

"Ellis, what the-" Nick grumbled, following him into the room.

Ellis crouched down over a small brown suitcase, unzipping it. The small hotel room was not all that impressive. Just a bathroom, a small closet, a bed and a TV on a dresser occupied the room, everything was brown. The hideous sea green floral wallpaper was a nice touch to kill the monotony of the poorly designed hotel room.

"Hey- kid, this isn't the time."

"Like hell this ain't the time." Ellis snarled, picking up much womens clothing from the suitcase and tossing it to the side.

"You're such an idiot at times I swe-"

"You fucking convince them that i'm immune then!" Ellis yelled, throwing a few shirts on the ground in front of Nick.

"Woah, hey- look-"

"No! Did y'all even consider that we ain't even CEDA employees?"

"Yes- of course-"

"Did y'all ever consider that we're covered in blood! We don't even look like we might _not_ have come into contact with them!"

"Ellis!" Nick grew angry.

"No, I'm not an idiot!" Ellis yelled, even more loudly than before. "I Can't show up lookin' damn near like a corpse!"

A loud hulking yell carried through the rooms making them both pause in place.

"That don't sound like a common infected..." Nick whispered.

Heavy footsteps rattled the floor around them, followed by a loud smash, almost as if a wall much farther down had crumbled. Whatever it was roared again, a very loud roar, clearly still holding traces of humanity in its voice. The footsteps grew louder, but slower. It was walking.

"Shit, we gotta get to the elevator!" Ellis whispered.

"Let's move," Nick said. "Now!"

The two poked their heads into the hallway. The creature was nowhere to be seen, but its footsteps still shook the floor. The elevator was only about 40 feet from them. They stepped out slowly, making their way towards the elevator.

Ellis turned backwards and noticed what appeared to be a bellboy running at them from up the hallway. Ellis raised his gun, which Nick grabbed and motioned 'no'. Nick looked at Ellis then charged at the infected running at them. Clearing two doorways before contact, Nick grabbed the infected throwing it into the closest room. Ellis ran behind Nick, and got into the room.

"Now!" Nick said as Ellis knew instinctively to draw his handgun yet again, firing a round into the infected which Nick threw onto the floor. The creature roared again, and the footsteps became faster and louder.

"Shit," Ellis panicked. "Maybe we should hide?"

The hotel room layout was simple: to the left of the entrance was a small closet, opposite that closet was a bathroom with just the bare essentials, all before the main room which held the bed an dressers and an amazing, while terrible, view of the city. Nick stepped into the closet, leaning up against the wall. Ellis moved into the bathroom, and the infected corpse of the bellboy lay quietly between the two. The creature, whose heavy breathing was clearly audible now, stormed up the hallway. Ellis could not see into the hall from the bathroom, but Nick had a slight foot-wide view.

Ellis locked his eyes on Nick's as the creature stepped into view in the hallway. There was a terrible silence. It was about seven feet tall, its arms and chest were massive, it had remnants of a pair of denim cuffs around its ankles from where it must have ripped through its clothing during mutation. Nick's eyes widened as he sunk back slowly into the closet. Ellis didn't need to see what it was in order to know it was trouble. The creature walked by very slowly, the smell of his ashy skin lingering around him.

"Mark, the chopper-" Analise's terrified voice exploded from the dead bellboy's walkie talkie. "It's almost he-"

"Fuck!" Nick yelled.

The hulking abomination roared and charged back up the hallway towards their room. Ellis dove out and grabbed the walkie-talkie, chucking it into the hall.

"Ro," Coach sighed. "I'm honestly beginning to see why Nick hates this girl so much."

"She's God damn annoying," Rochelle barked. "She needs to shut up is what she needs to do."

"I'm 'bout to take the next walkie-talkie I see and ram it down her throat."

"You're beginning to sound like him," she smiled.

The low crying from far away didn't hinder their need to proceed with caution, so they both spoke lowly, walking slowly.

"Hey, check it…" Rochelle said, nodding towards a small emergency fire safety box on the wall.

"Betta' be a cheeseburga' in there."

Rochelle moved over to it and punched the glass, shattering it. Quickly she retracted her hand and shook it out.

"Sweet jesus, that hurt," she said. Coach reached inside pulling out the small axe that resided within.

The crying that carried through the dead air of the hotel grew louder. Nothing occupied the halls besides several corpses and potted plants. Behind one of those plants was the silhouette of a woman, sitting on the floor, her head hung low, sobbing.

"Oh my God," Rochelle whispered. "She's alive!"

She ran towards the weeping woman and stopped abruptly in front of her. The woman was very pale, and most of her clothing had been torn off. Locks of gray hair fell in front of her face as she cried. She was almost on top of a corpse of a man in a black outfit. A small white name badge could be seen on his left pectoral.

"Are you okay?" Rochelle asked in a concerned voice.

The woman lifted her head and he cries began to cease. Low rolling growls emitted from her as she locked eyes with Rochelle. Her eyes, while human, remained lifeless, almost as if they weren't exactly seeing anything at all. The growling woman stood up slowly in a very normal manner, although it was possibly the most frightening thing they had witnessed. Her growls grew louder, and she started to make small screams. She extended her hands, which were they were no longer. Her pale grayish fingers no longer had nails, but claws.

"Back up!" Coach yelled readying his axe.

--------


	6. In Case of emergency Pt II

**Hi everyone. This chapter may be a little sketchy because I haven't went over it as much as I'd like to have, but I won't be home for a while so I'd rather post it now then wait a week.**

**Thanks for the reviews. It makes me feel better about my boring self ;) haha but seriously. I'm impressed people have actually read this much of it.. Well here it is, R&R please. Continuation to Chapter 5.  
**

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The massive creature grunted and roared, looking around, with heavy breaths. It was trying to find the source of Analise's voice, the walkie-talkie. In a fit of rage, it thrashed its bulging arms around slammed the walls. It was still emitting the inhumane roars, when it noticed the radio. It stepped forward and lifted both arms and in a gorilla-like state, pounded the ground annihilating the walkie-talkie, and severely damaged the floor. Nick held his breath as the creature reared it's small deformed face into the room.  
Suddenly, the it turned around due to rapid footsteps running up the hall, a Charger had taken sight of the creature and slammed into it, knocking it off balance.

"Oh shit!" Nick yelled, he then stood up quickly and shut the door to their room while it was distracted.

The two creatures fought in the hallway and the noise had began to attract most of the infected on the floor. Many footsteps flooded the hall, and the room shook violently on occasion. The hulking abomination was clearly pounding the place to hell and everything that came near it.

"What the fuck do we do man?!" Ellis yelled in a whisper.

Nick placed his hands on his head and paced nervously.

Ellis moved over to the window, wincing whenever the creature would slam the floor outside, knowing that they might as well be next on it's list.

"I got it!" Nick yelled as he ran into the bathroom, ripping open the cabinet, scouring through the bottles.

"Nick yer' hair looks fine," Ellis scolded. "Is now_ really_ the time?"

"Shut up!"

Nick grabbed three bottles from the sink and sprayed each one to see if it worked. Two of them were spray hairspray and one was aerosol.

"Grab whatever is flammable and give me your lighter!" Nick said quickly.

"I can't," Ellis answered feeling his pockets. "Rochelle has it."

"Whatever, just grab whatever looks like it'll burn."

Nick hurried to the window, pulling down all the brown drapes, then started pulling the sheets off the bed.

He tossed the blankets and the drapes in front of the door. Ellis emerged from the bathroom with a few towels adding to the pile. Nick placed the two spray cans next to the pile of stuff and held the aerosol can with his lighter, and it seemed like a second after he torched, the drapes were ablaze, the blankets followed shortly. Ellis picked up handfuls of womens clothing from the suitcase he had been searching through and tossed it into the fire.

"All right, so yew gonna tell me what we're doin?" Ellis asked. The fire slowly spread to the wallpaper, climbing the walls. Smoke started to fill the room. Nick sprayed the Aerosol can more to aid the fire in spreading. The floor shook violently again, as the infected outside were pounded into oblivion.

"We're gonna burn it!"

Thats when the door to their room busted open showering Nick with bits of flaming wood chips.

"Oh shit!" Ellis yelled.

* * *

"Oh shit!" Rochelle screamed as she backed up against the wall, the woman throwing her arms up in the air getting ready to claw at her. Coach ran at her thrusting his axe forward, but the woman ran directly into him knocking him off balance and continued to charge at Rochelle.

"Run!" Coach yelled to Rochelle who had already begun to sprint up the hallway.

The woman ran behind her, arms spread open, claws extended, screaming a blood curdling scream. Coach hustled behind them. Rochelle ran towards the elevator hopelessly before the small of her back blew up in a small explosion of burning pain, where it slashed its claws. Rochelle let out a shriek of pain before diving onto the floor beside the open elevator. Coach ran as fast as he could, with axe in hand as the woman crouched above Rochelle screaming raising her arms up in the air. Rochelle squirmed trying to bring herself to her feet but to no avail. The woman lunged in for the kill but didn't succeed thanks to Coach tackling her from behind into the elevator.

Rochelle scrambled up onto her feet and reached her hand inside hitting the door close button. Coach hurried out of the elevator as the woman began to stand up.

Ding. The doors shut in time, and the sounds of endless scratching could be heard inside.

"What- what," Rochelle said, breathing heavily. "What was that?!"

"I don't know," Coach replied, panting heavily. "You okay though?"

Coach motioned for Rochelle to turn around as he lifted the back of her shirt a bit.

"That bitch got you good."

"I'll be fine," she answered. "It's not that deep."

"We best be catching up to them..."Coach stated plainly, panting. "They must've gone to the roof."

"This is some-" Rochelle started.

* * *

"Crazy shit we got ourselves into, eh?" Ellis smiled weakly, looking downwards off the side of the building.

Not once in his mind did the idea cross him that he'd thoroughly enjoy the view of a dying city from the 17th floor ledge of a hotel. Something serene about it. It was broad daylight and it wasn't as muggy and hot as it normally was. The skyline was beautiful, despite the creatively drawn lines of smoke protruding from various buildings throughout. The sounds of screams and gunshots echoed in the air. The city was very much still alive.

"What the fuck is that thing?!" Nick yelled.

"Ionno man, looks like the hulk," Ellis responded. "Cept, he ain't green."

The large creature screamed in rage as it thrashed around the blazing hotel room.

"What we gonna do man, wait for it to burn?"

"Unless you feel like scaling the building to get to the roof."

"Naw, that's crazy."

"No shit Ellis."

"Let's just keep moving," Ellis replied. "This ledge can get us to the end of the hall right?"

"Hold on, let me check my blueprints."

"You don't have to be such a dick, Nick."

"Congratulations, maybe you didn't cheat through second grade, you can rhyme simple words. I'm proud Ellis."

Ellis moved sideways, trying to hold his footing. There was plenty of room to stand, enough for two people side by side if need be, although he took no step without caution. One faulty movement and it would be his last. He moved a bit more, passing in front of the window leading into the adjacent hotel room. Smoke was pouring beneath the door inside from the room they'd been in prior. Nick followed behind him, moving slowly, practically holding is breath.

That was when the creature not so much broke through the door into the next room, but more or less destroyed the entire wall in a loud explosion of drywall crumbling. The inferno that was the room they had set on fire was now filled with intense orange flame, spreading to the next. The creature looked around, standing in the fire as its skin slowly turned black, and spotted the two on the balcony and ran at the window.

"Oh shit, keep going!" Nick yelled.

Nick barely passed the window when the creatures fist busted through; shattering it and knocking him backwards. He tried to gain his balance back but lost it and fell backwards grabbing onto the ledge. It thrashed it's arms around as the brown drapes hanging from the window tangled with it.

"Oh fuck!" Ellis gripped his handgun and started squeezing shots into the small destroyed window at the creature.

It was now charred severely; yet still threw its arms in anger, crashing into everything around it reaching for Ellis while emitting a disgruntled roar of pain and rage unheard of before.

The creature Lifted it's arm and slammed into the remaining window, completely demolishing the wall it rested on. Ellis fired three more shots before clicking empty.

"Shit!" He yelled, throwing his empty handgun at the rampaging creature trying to make its way onto the ledge through the destroyed wall.

Nick groaned as he tried to hold himself up on the ledge suspending him seventeen stories.

Just then another loud roar filled the air, except this time, it sounded more of an bovine than that of a zombie.

The large creature spun around looking into the room but it was too late. The same charger from before that had attacked it had began a sprint at close proximity. The creature lifted it's massive fist to pound it but was too slow, the charger collided with it, both of them stumbling from the ledge, right behind Nick. The two creatures roared as they relentlessly swiped at each other on their way down to the ground floor, crashing through the glass roof of the La grange's lobby. The hideous brown drapes followed closely behind them.

Instinctively without words Ellis ran to Nick whose face had turned a bright red as his muscles weakened by holding himself up.

"I got you. I got you." Ellis whispered to himself, gripping Nicks hand and pulling his arm up.

"Fucking shit!" Nick gasped.

Ellis pulled Nick up fully and both of them fell backwards a bit. Nick sat back against the wall. Ellis next to him.

"Ho-ly shit," Ellis released while gasping for air. "That was fucking c-!"

"Close?"

"Naw! That shit was cool as hell!"

Black smoke bled from the openings around them as they sat there, catching their breath. Nick reached into his pocket, pulling out a small black poker chip. He kissed it then gripped it tightly in his hand.

"You do realize, we are the luckiest people alive... right?" Nick said with a hint of joy in his voice.

"Oh shit, for a second I thought you was gonna smile." Ellis laughed.

* * *

"So this is Mark." Rochelle said, kneeling down over the corpse that the woman had been crouching over before attacking.

She ripped off his name badge and wiped the trickles of blood onto her shirt. She hadn't noticed it earlier, but Marks stomach had been completely shredded, his intestine and other gory chunks of red decorated the walls and floor around him.

Coach moved to the corpse and used the bottom of the axe to shrug away some of the bloody mess covering his pants, he then dug into his pockets and pulled out a wallet.

"I'll be damned." Coach said.

"What's up?"

"He's with CEDA."

"He doesn't look like a CEDA employee," Rochelle sighed. "Let's just get to the roof before Nick takes off without us.."

"You think Ellis would let him do that to us?"

"I don't know what I'm thinking..." Rochelle said as she pressed her hand against her lower back and grunted due to the burning feeling.

"Up these stairs." Coach nodded, slamming through the door. Only more dead bodies inhabited the stairwell.

"Analise and her boys must've done this." Rochelle said, running up the stairs.

By the twenty fifth floor, Coach began to heave and wheeze passing an open door, continuing up the stairs slowly. Rochelle ran ahead.

"Who the hell decided- to put an evac station... up thirty flights of god damn stairs..." He sighed.

"Maybe the helicopter-" Nick said appearing in the hallway, looking equally as tired. "Maybe it's made of chocolate."

"Oh shit," Rochelle yelled, stopping, looking over the railing down at Nick. "Shit shit shit you guys put some serious worry on us! Where's Ellis?"

Rochelle headed down the stairs as they climbed up. Ellis poked his head out from the doorway and started to ascend.

"We thought y'all woulda been on the roof by now." Ellis laughed.

That's when he noticed Rochelle. He was very glad to see her, but it was his hat which resided upon her head which intrigued him the most.

"You- my hat!" Ellis exclaimed. "You have it!"

"I do indeed, you'll get it back on the roof." she answered with a smile, as she began running up the stairs.

Coach could barely speak he was panting so much.

"We're almost there boss." Nick said, patting him on the back as they all climbed the stairs toward the helicopter that awaited them.

Rochelle saw the light of the roof pouring through the doorway as she reached the final few steps. The sound of a chopper flooded the air. She ran through the doorway dangling Ellis' hat.

"Get the fuck on the ground." Analise said, standing in the open, her hair flapping in the wind with a handgun aimed directly at Rochelle. The helicopter had just gotten there and was about to land as it did circles around the building.

"Woah! Take it easy!" Rochelle put out her hands in fear as she slowly got down on her knees.

Analise's parter stood close by, a very large man, with a thick beard. He wore a black outfit as if he had stepped straight out of a James Bond film and held an assault rifle. The same outfit worn by the Mark, the corpse killed by the crazy female infected.

"What are you doing here?" Analise questioned.

"You told us to come here!" Rochelle yelled.

Ellis stepped onto the roof and the cheerful look on his face dissipated. Silently he sunk to the ground at the will of the man with the assault rifle. The man holding the assault rifle was clearly tired. His eyes had bags, he was sweating, he could hardly stand straight, let alone aim an AK-47.

Ellis had no choice though so he submitted willingly to the silent demands that had him get on his knees.

The helicopter flew overhead calling out a mix of words unable to be heard above its engine.

Analise backed up as the helicopter came down to the ground.

"They're infected!" she yelled to the pilot.

"They don't look infected." The pilot responded.

"Are you fucking kidding me?" Rochelle said standing up ignoring the firearms aimed at her. "We're immune! You told us to come! You made us come here!"

Analise hopped into the back of the chopper and the man with her followed. He jumped up onto the back but as he did, the wind of the blades spinning flapped his jacket up and down, exposing a small bloody bite mark on his lower back.

"He's infected." Ellis said.

"What?" Rochelle questioned.

"He's infected!" Ellis yelled, louder this time.

Analise took her eyes off of the Rochelle and Ellis and placed her gun against the back of the pilots head, who froze up.

"This bitch is crazy!" Ellis yelled, running at the chopper, halting due to the infected man, aiming his rifle at him.

Coach came out followed by Nick who's jaws dropped as the chopper began to lift back into the air.

Within moments the chopper was elevated above the roof. Analise's partner then slumped backwards in his seat. Dropping his AK-47 onto the ground below. She yelled some inaudible things but it was apparent she was telling the pilot to fly at gunpoint.

"What the hell!?" Nick yelled. "What's going on!"

"Wea they goin?!" Coach followed up.

"That psycho bitch aimed her gun at us and then she aimed it at the pilot!" Ellis yelled at them.

"Oh my god... no no no no," Nick held his temple and began pacing. "No no no fuck!"

"That man was bit! He doesn't look immune!"

"Good! I wish that bitch would just die already!" Nick yelled.

Suddenly the chopper jerked violently above them clearing the building now above the street. Two gunshots fired from within. One body fell out tumbling, most likely it was dead before it hit the ground. It wasn't Analise.

"What the-!" Rochelle gasped.

The helicopter dipped forwards away from the building, but the tail slammed into the concrete of the roof. The survivors each ran and dove as the propeller exploded into little bits of metal shards showering the roof. The helicopter spun out, digging what remained of the tail into about the 26th floor of the La grange, sliding down, flipping over, tearing the side of the building like a tin can. The survivors gathered around as an explosion rocked the entire building.

Nick stood up in shock.

"Good job Nick," Ellis said disapprovingly. "You got yer wish, and now we're fucked."

Coach dropped down to his knees.  
Rochelle moved over to Ellis putting her hand on his shoulder, handing his hat back to him.

He dusted it off and put it on his head.

For a moment the entire group stood there silently, watching the smoke rise from the wreck below.

Their escape wasn't going to be via chopper.

"Sooo.... about what just happened." Ellis broke the silence.


	7. Pause

Hello few people I have left reading. Thanks for being troopers, I appreciate your support and words.

And no the pairing isn't EllisxHat.

Haha.

So I need everyones help right about now.

I've come to the realization that the story is moving very slow and in the grand scheme of things, I

definitely won't be able to hold everyones attention for 4 more campaigns, as much as I'd love to write

it all, it'd take forever, and I'm lacking the skills and patience with work and school

If y'all would take a vote I'd appreciate it greatly. This where I need you guys to tell me where this story is going.

What would be more interesting?

I'll list the campaigns and a small bit of information, remember they won't be strictly following the way they go in the game, much like the dead center wasn't exactly like dead center.

They will go to the mall next. It's after that, that hopefully I'll have enough votes to tell me which direction you'd like to see it go in.

a) Continue going at the pace you were going and let the story die when it dies, don't rush it.

b) Dark Carnival : The survivors getaway abruptly stopped by a highway full of abandoned cars must venture through one of CEDAs attempted safe zone in Whispering Oaks amusement park. Follows closely to the game.

c) Swamp Fever : The survivors stumble upon a small village secluded in the swamp, led by CEDA, fending off the infection. All is well, the survivors have found safety in the infection free village, for now... Strays away from the games set events but eventually gets back on track.

d) Hard Rain : A simple run for gas goes awry when the towns supply is limited and the search is halted due to an approaching storm. Follows game mostly.

e) The Parish : The last stand, New Orleans is the last city being evacuated, then where are all the evacuation centers? CEDA is done and the army is stepping in.

Mix match, let me know what you guys want me to exclude, include and whatnot. Don't have to pick just one.

Thanks!


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